


letters (from h, with love)

by cloudburst



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-05-16 06:47:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19312825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudburst/pseuds/cloudburst
Summary: Alex finds letters from Henry. They're all a bit much, and he's a bit in love.





	1. the morning

**Author's Note:**

> i'm a sap for love letters. i never want them to end

Location: Under the pillow - Alex’s bedroom, Washington D.C.

_I. The Morning_

> _Alex,_
> 
> _I know I said that your body comes back to me in dreams, but that doesn’t begin to encapsulate the truth. I see you in the day when we are apart, your warm arms around me as you hold me from behind – heat of your back pressing against mine as we’ve just crawled from bed. And I am so insistent to begin the day, though I’d rather do nothing than turn and bring my lips to your neck, hear your laughter in my ear – warmth of your breath making me feel fire across my skin. (I am insistent, for I know that if we do not part, I will never find myself away from you. I will relent. Again and again. As you pull me back with excuses that continue to grow in their frailty, until you are finally making us late with the excuse that you are kissing me just to kiss me. (This is my favorite excuse.) I will give in to you, and you will take. I want nothing more than to give.)_
> 
> _You are the rising sun, bringing light to my life – the star rising in the East. I never want to leave your side, for I never wish to see you set. If you were to disappear, it would all be cold, and I would no longer burn with a purpose beyond myself. I love what I do, who I have become, but I love you more. This is a perilous attitude to hold, I know – a dreadful position, even – but I don’t care, for in the morning when I wake up with you holding me I am whole. Warm arms and a small smile, with the most putrid morning breath across my face that does not even begin to faze me, all equate to a world where I am happy. Do not tell me I can live without you; this, I know. I do not wish to, and there is no time I am more acutely aware of this than the morning. (Today, I woke up in your arms. I am writing this before my flight, and this is my apology for the increasingly messy scrawl. However, I am not sorry for letting you know I feel the warmth leaving my body, ice freezing my bones at the thought of being far from you, though I know I will return to you. We have infinite time together, but it could never be enough.)_
> 
> _I could see an infinity of sunrises with you, Alex. They would never be enough._
> 
> _Yours, with no manner of dignity,_
> 
> _H_


	2. your smile

Location: Lanyard pouch – Alex’s jacket pocket, Washington D.C.

_II. Your Smile_

> _First Son of the United States and Irrevocable, yet Stubborn Monarch of my Heart,_
> 
> _I hope this letter finds you well, and at a time I’m not in the country. The only time I wish to be away from you is when you’re reading this drivel I’ve masked as lovely prose under the guise of my love for you – and the knowledge that I must be away from you, at times – the times I consider the longest of my life. Though they may be rewarding, they would be more so if you were there to bask in them with me. (You tell me I am allowed to be happy, and that I am worth the love I receive from those around me. You tell me I am allowed to be proud of myself, and that I should be so. Yet I feel no more love, and no prouder than when your smile is turned on me – when I see the slight crinkle around your eyes, knowing that I have made you smile so wide. I feel my face reflect yours, a smile wider than any I’ve ever known, and I know I am loved. It is thanks to you, and that damned smile I know it to be true.)_
> 
> _I hope that, as you read, the beginnings of that smile begin to form. I want nothing more for the rest of my life than to be able to bask in the sunrise of your smile, and feel the warmth upon my face. You are far too bright, always, and I have always been destined to burn. (I am quite pale in comparison to the sun.)_
> 
> _I think perhaps your smile is the reason I began to fall in love with you. You were confident and beautiful, but the strength of your gaze on me, the power of your expression made me want all the more the things I would never be allowed to have – more specifically you. (Even more specifically, to be able to wake up in the morning with your arms around me, the force of that smile turned to face me. Even on the rainiest of days as I laid in the palace, I would fantasize the sun would kiss me awake, and eventually, you did. Now, I know what it feels like to burn in the morning – to wake up with a warmth stronger than anyone who told me otherwise. You have given the phrase sun kissed a whole new meaning.)_
> 
> _I hope to make you smile, endlessly and always._
> 
> _Yours,_
> 
> _HRH Prince Dickhead_


	3. your hands

Location: Folded, tacked to a Bulletin Board – Alex’s bedroom, Washington D.C.

_III. Your Hands_

> _A,_
> 
> _I oftentimes find myself struck by an inability to move when thinking about your hands. (This is true when I think of them in any context – on me, around me, as you flip the page of a book. I feel the ghost of your touch everywhere, always. Your hands are heavy across my skin, and the light press of your fingertips are never to be ignored.)_
> 
> _One of the things I love so much about you is that you know the touch I crave. I find myself drawn back to a very specific memory of your hands, and when I afterward realized they were such an essential part of my life. The weather had been foul – long dashes across the window suffocating me, gloomy to match my disposition. I had been in a dreadful state, missing my father and the opportunities time had not afforded us. My stomach pressed to the top of the comforter in my bedroom in Kensington. You had been visiting for a media tour, but we owned the night. The night simply proved dreary, and I myself – but altered. Yet you knew what to do, as you are a part of me as much as my insecurities. Your hands rubbed across my back, slipping gently under my shirt – your fingertips pressing light into bare skin. I did not immediately feel the pain alleviate, and I will not claim I did, yet I felt as though bad parts were leaving through you. (Like a thief in the night, you stole into my heart and began to slowly take bad things. How this benefited you, I cannot say, but it further proves my point: that you are a part of me. And you, Alex, are perhaps the most beautiful part. Though we are separate people with separate lives, you make me feel as though I am not alone – ever. This is what your hands do; this is your power. And as always, I am awestruck.)_
> 
> _Your hands are beautiful – a reflection of you, enigmatic: coarse and soft, holding me gently, gripping me with hard intentions. I desire nothing but to kiss them. I desire nothing but to hold them. (In this way, they are a reflection of you as well – as they make me feel fire beneath their touch. In the softest of moments, you melt me like sugar in the rain and I crumble beneath you.)_
> 
> _I know you have a similar obsession with my hands – with my touch. Though you do not wear gloves most times, it makes me light to know you turn to wildfire beneath my burning palms._
> 
> _I miss you. Very much._
> 
> _H_


	4. everything

Location: Under the pillow - Hotel Room, Paris, France. 

_IV. Everything_

> _Perhaps this is too much for one letter, and though I am beginning to write – I will be inclined to agree with the Henry who, hours from now will realize in his reflection that he left out so many things that he adores. (He will be filled with regret, and inevitably text or call to tell you so. He will love even more than I love you as I write this, for though I do not see how it is possible – my love for you only grows and grows until I feel I will burst. I am bursting at the seams like a school boy longing to leave the yard for home. You are home, and anywhere else – anyone else – is unforgivably not home, not you. I have admittedly stolen my simile from Shakespeare; yet somehow, I don’t think he will mind.)_
> 
> _Love goes toward love as school boys from their books, but love from love? Toward school with heavy looks._
> 
> _I love that you know who you are – that determined smile that spreads across your face when you’ve made up your mind about something. I love that you are you. I love that you love me. To blanket statement what I cannot sum with words, I love everything about you. I am unable to truly express how I feel in words, even with the prowess you always say I possess, so you must accept that I adore you – entirely and completely, with all of me. (Even when you are being stubborn, once we have resolved the issue, I want to kiss the wrinkle between your brows. I want to kiss you, always.)_
> 
> _Yours, In Inability to Express with Words the Depth of My Feeling,_
> 
> _H_


	5. your hair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this during my little sister’s dentist appointment on my phone. wassup

Location: Alex’s desk, tucked under a paper weight - Alex’s bedroom, Washington D.C.

_V. Your Hair_

> _Alex Claremont-Diaz,_
> 
> _You are, without a doubt, one of the most stubborn men I know. And that – that makes me irrevocably in love with you. (Many parts of you are stubborn. I suppose that is the true subject of this letter. I cannot sleep, and I only long to run my fingers through your hair – hold you tight to my chest and know that nothing will change from that moment. I am stubborn in that way as well, yet when I have you in my embrace, feel your hair between my fingers, I melt. Then, your hair must be the subject of this letter – for it is stubborn. It is dark and curled and representative of all things I love about you – everything. It is untamed. I hope it never is.)_
> 
> _I recall a time when things out of the ordinary would cause me undue stress – would cause me to contemplate all things I wanted yet could never have. Yet, knowing you as I do now, I can see that the unexpected is what makes life worth living. You crashed into my life without a care. (You shoved me into a cake without a care as well, and I am grateful for this every day.) Before we were together, I often wondered what it would be like to let go to something wild – to hold a passion in my arms greater than any monarchy could squander. I realize now that nothing could be stronger, or more un-dampened, than the love I feel for you._
> 
> _This is akin to the hot water of the shower across our backs, you leaning into my touch as I massage your funny smelling shampoo into your scalp. Your hair is wet – dampened, as love often is over time. (Even when times are against us, my love for you burns in the rain.) Yet, your curls return. They prevail. They are soft beneath my fingertips, as I am beneath your touch. (You’re thinking: Henry, this is what hair does. It maintains its shape. I am thinking: it is a metaphor, my love.)_
> 
> _In Eternal Admiration of Absolutely Every Part of You,_
> 
> _H_


	6. your laugh

Location: In Alex’s laptop - Alex’s backpack, Washington D.C.

__

_VI. Your Laugh_

__

__

> __
> 
> _A,_
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> _There are very few noises on this earth I love more than hearing you say that you love me. These include, but perhaps are not limited to: the muted sound of your hot breath in my ear, the way you make a noise low in your throat in moments I have deemed just for us (these moments are not even for this pen or paper to know – for you are mine, and I do not feel like sharing), and your laugh. I know that, at times, you are self-conscious about the snorting cacophony that many have come to associate with you, maybe wishing that it was something others would characterize as a ringing, like bells – or perhaps a deep sound, crashing like the ocean. I would wish no change to your laughter, not now and not given the opportunity. (I would change nothing about you, however. Yet know that when I say this, I am in no way biased. Of course, I am not.)_
> 
>  __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> __
> 
> _You are charming in so many ways, and that your laughter punches like a mixed martial artist who has consumed far too many bottles of shitty American beer is one of them. I hold moments where I can take in the sound dearest to me close, because that means you are happy, smiling (and we know your smile is one of the things I love most about you – around me, against me, extant and constantly), and these moments of laughter mean that you are glad to be in my presence. Never before have I wanted anything more than to continue to make you laugh._
> 
>  _ ___
> 
> __
> 
> ____
> 
> __
> 
> ____
> 
> __
> 
> ____
> 
> _I feel love in your laughter – when it is because of something I have said or done, or when it is for a reason entirely unrelated to me. I feel love. Perhaps that is why I always strive to make you laugh. (It is entirely selfish, you see. I love you for my own benefit. Anything less would be unbecoming of a future King. And it is for my own benefit that I write you this letter – for when you read this section, your laughter will sound louder than any set of bells – and I will know, no matter where I am, that you are laughing. I will feel love.)_
> 
>  _ _ ____
> 
> __
> 
> ______
> 
> __
> 
> ______
> 
> __
> 
> ______
> 
> _Selfishly Yours,_
> 
>  _ _ _ _____
> 
> __
> 
> ________
> 
> __
> 
> ________
> 
> __
> 
> ________
> 
> _H_
> 
>  _ _ _ _ ______
> 
> __
> 
> __________
> 
> __
> 
> __________
> 
> __
> 
> __________

_  
_  
___  
_  
  
__

**Author's Note:**

> ily, lemme know how you feel


End file.
